Jon Pearlman rode the coattails of the grassroots NIMBY movement that took down Terra and Frisbie Group’s One Boca proposal all the way to a city council seat.
Pearlman, 37, is the founder of Save Boca, the Boca Raton-based organization that led the campaign against Terra and Frisbie’s proposed redevelopment of the city’s government campus.
The months-long fight culminated in the March 10 election that voted down One Boca, and elected Pearlman and two other Save Boca-backed candidates, Michelle Grau and Stacy Sipple, in a landslide win that dramatically shifted the city council to an anti-development majority.
It was a battle won with Pearlman’s purse. Campaign finance records show he spent more than $250,000 of his own funds on his own city council campaign and three political committees affiliated with his Save Boca organization.
It marks a rapid ascent in the city’s political scene for Pearlman, who had never before voted in a local Boca Raton election. Pearlman said he found his way to public advocacy after watching the city council, which awarded the government campus redevelopment bid to Terra and Frisbie in February of last year, make decisions “clearly in the interest of the developer.”
“I’m not a career politician, I just love my city,” he said.
Pearlman works in investment management and hangs his real estate license with LoKation Real Estate, according to state records.
He grew up on New York’s Upper East Side, the son of Susan Schneider and Mark Pearlman. A former Harvard tennis player, he founded the fitness company Mission Lean with his wife, the former Lyudmila Bouzinova, who competed in season 9 of “America’s Next Top Model.”
Records show he lives in Downtown Boca Raton, at a 0.6-acre property he assembled in a trio of acquisitions totaling $3 million between 2018 and 2023. He completed the 5,800-square-foot home in 2023. While that home was under construction, he lived in a waterfront Palm Beach home that belongs to his grandparents, records show.
Pearlman, through the Florida entity 963 Hillsboro LLC, bought the oceanfront home at 963 Hillsboro Mile in Hillsboro Beach for $8 million in May of last year, records show.
Last summer, Pearlman launched his two petitions to fight the One Boca proposal, an effort that quickly collected thousands of signatures and forced Terra, led by David Martin, and Frisbie, led by Rob Frisbie Jr. and Cody Crowell, to agree to a referendum on the project in September.
Pearlman launched his bid for City Council Seat B soon after, pitting him against incumbent Marc Widger. Widger, a real estate developer and longtime Boca Raton official, called Pearlman “a one-issue opponent” with a myopic focus on the city’s downtown.
Pearlman faced setbacks. A judge ruled his proposed Save Boca laws unconstitutional in December, and Save Boca leadership splintered in the runup to the election, but Pearlman ultimately unseated Widger with 52.9 percent of the vote.
While he won his seat, Pearlman’s Save Boca NIMBY movement proved even more successful at the ballot box. Of the 18,931 votes cast, 74.5 percent were against One Boca.
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